JARVIS: AWOL
by Uylear
Summary: T. Stark is building a new IM suit not long after then events of New York. The motivations behind the build are many. However, whilst in the test phase of a new prototype module, something goes wrong with Jarvis, and the dependable AI Tony so very much relies upon in his loneliest moments starts developing some strange behaviours.


**J.A.R.V.I.S: AWOL**

"_The bond between a man and a machine is like, well, especially in my case, like the one between a mother and child – unbreakable... Until Jarvis"_

_- Tony Stark, post suit MK*** Termination_

**Chapter One**

**Moon**

'How we doing, buddy?' asked Tony.

** Rather well, sir. No errors to report. Current velocity is optimal to a margin of less than zero point zero zero zero one six percentage of the fuel efficiency rate**

Tony raised a brow. As he hurtled ever skywards, about to leave the Earths atmosphere, he switched visual modes into the IR range, and activated close range, wide-field LiDAR.

'Switch to pump boosters on my mark. 3-2-1… mark.'

The all gold Iron Man erupted past the sound barrier in mere moments. As the air became thinner, its speed increased, faster and faster, becoming a golden streak of rocket fuelled fire, heading towards space with relentless determination.

** Congratulations sir. Twenty five thousand miles per hour. Vital signs are good**

'C'mon buddy, let's do this. Three days to beat!'

**Three days, three hours and forty nine minutes to be precise. Shall I inform NASA?**

'They ought to know by now – let them know I'll bring some cheese back, though.'

It was an unprecedented move bolder than what even Pepper Potts could imagine Tony doing. Their conversation, after he had mentioned visiting the moon, resembled a mother and child discussing why a pirates life was not suitable, or that building a house made of marshmallow was unfeasible. For all the sense she spoke, Pepper could not convince Tony otherwise.

'What if something goes wrong? What if you die up there? In a metal coffin, and no-one can get you back?'

'Impossible. Ask Jarvis.'

'Don't drag the children into this!'

Tony stared at Pepper, an exaggerated expression of astonishment painting his face. 'Jarvis, tell her.'

**Ms Potts –**

'Pepper, please.'

**Sorry. Ms Pepper, the mission's success scenarios all lead to a one hundred per cent successful outcome, with zero margin of error**

'See. Jarvis is never wrong.'

Pepper calmly sat, clapping her hands together, and pointed them to Tony. 'It's not about the outcome, not about the projections or any of that – it's about being responsible, about understanding the risks not only for yourself, but for _me_, Tony.'

She remembered the day Tony came back from his first "mission". The bullet riddled armour, the bruises – the violence he had put himself through despite what he had already encountered. She understood that part of Tony just fine. Had even accepted it, loved him for it no less – but this, this outlandish idea to travel to the moon, to circumnavigate it just to score points on his ego went beyond reasonable tolerance. Pepper could see no good reason, no good reason at all why he should do this.

'Think beyond the Earth – look beyond our sky, and imagine what's out there, waiting for its time. Pepper, Stark Industries _made weapons._ Horrible weapons. I… I am a weapon – and we are _massively _outgunned if you hadn't noticed. For all we know, there's some bad-ass alien nut-job up there hell bent on taking all _this_, all of our beloved humanity and turning it into an pet on a leash that get's whipped for fun.' Pause. 'I'm not prepared to let that happen. So… I'm taking steps.'

'On the moon?'

** Sir, SHIELD is on the phone**

'What was that about children?' Said Tony.

Pepper shook her head. 'I can't believe you sometimes.'

* * *

Tony started to dwell on the time spent alone ahead of him. A mission o the moon, though exciting to plan, build for and undertake, was, in all reality, the loneliest mission he could dream up.

'Jarvis, call Pepper'

** Dialling Miss Potts**

Two dial tones passed before Pepper picked up. 'Where are you?'

'Erm, Stratosphere?'

'Oh, then maybe whilst there you can collect your ego.'

'It's a good view.'

'Of your ego?'

'No, I like to put that behind me these days. Hey, hey, are you by the display, you can see me, right?'

'Yes, I can see you.'

'Ok, all you need to know is right there – you can see the heart bit, top left corner?'

Pepper looked to the heart on the screen. She was on the 12th floor of Stark towers. Half of the floor was converted to Mission Control. What that amounted to was a few diagnostic screens, and a large display that showed an image fed from an internal camera within the suits helmet. Tony had called it SpaceBook. The heart had the word "awesome" embedded over it in green letters. Pepper smiled. 'I see it. Does it say anything else?'

'Yeah. Not so awesome and not awesome.'

'I love you baby.

'You sure you don't want to join me? The view, honey, the view – amazing.'

'Can I see?'

Stark adjusted his trajectory, flipping the Space Armor MK I to face Earth as he drifted further away from it. Pepper saw via the suits camera the vista of Earth – the marbled myriad of blues and greens coalescing together against a jet black backdrop. It was a perspective she needed – that Earth was a fragile, lonely planet and needed its heroes for protection. She never always saw it like that.

* * *

After Tony took the SHIELD call, Tony returned to Peppers composed self. Whilst she had been waiting, she made a list of points for Tony to consider – hopefully with the aim of dispelling this voyage into the childish venture it was.

'That was SHIELD. Said I'm good to go.'

'Oh so you went _behind_ my back on this?'

Tony just stood.

'Listen, Tony – have you really thought about this? Do you even have the ability to, to make a suit for that kind of mission? Why on earth would you even think a tin-man could make it? Haven't you ever wondered why NASA made very little progress…'

Tony interjected, his animation more erratic than usual. 'First of all, I don't _work_ for NASA, and if I did, I'd have never made the Iron Man. Stark industries even wanted to work alongside them, but they refused – something about patriotism and bad press – I forget – silly really. What I mean is they made their mark in space simply because Stark Industries was too busy dealing with ground matters – and you know what – we've, no _you_ have done a pretty good job I'd say. Look at it from a PR point of view – Stark, bringing space to the people.'

'Stark?' questioned Pepper.

'Industries. I said that, right?'

'This is insane. Jarvis, tell him he's insane.

**Sir, you are insane**

'Oh c'mon, don't gang up on me – especially you buddy.'

**You programmed me to obey**

'Did I programme you to lecture me, Oprah?

**Being rude won't win an argument, sir**

'This family is dysfunctional.' Sighed Pepper, melting into the sofa. Tony sat next to her, taking her into his chest. 'I know the risks – I've got the tech. We've come leaps and bounds. Do you really want me to start going into condenser arrays and EMR buckle-points, tin man mechanics…'

'Yes, I do. That's exactly what I want actually. Everything. Show me everything. Tony, I might not be able to stop you doinf this, but you need to convince me it's worthwhile – that this isn't some lab experiment of yours just so you can convince yourself "_it works_" Not only that, but you'll be gone. What if something happens'

'We have two lab experiments guarding the ground. One, successful, the other a mistake – but experiments that work!'

'I want to see everything. And I'm sorry for calling it tin man.'

'Yes, maam.'

* * *

'Okay, Jarvis, let's do what we came here to do. Activate the IED-ionisation process please. Keep levels solid as they are on the inertial dampening fields, though.

**Sir?**

'Feel the tolerances.'

** I'll keep the order in standby. Alignment is centre. May I remind that during the boost phase comms and non-essential systems need to be off-lined to make for processing capacity**

'I'll speak to you soon, Pepper'

'Good luck!'

**Activating the Ion Rocket in 5,4,3,2,1**

Space seemed to tear apart for Tony as he shot directly towards the moon at a velocity which would ordinarily tear anything other than an Iron Man apart. But Tony's prowess in engineering defied physics – and the rest was yet to come.

**We have reached optimal speed, sir. Shall I deploy our package?**

**The SHIELD Call**

'Tony.'

'Yes, dear.'

'We have a mission for you. Briefing package being delivered now. It's encoded.

'I'm kind of in the middle of, well, the beginning, end and middle of a domestic right now.'

'We want you to test a prototype.'

'Oh.'

'Toys, Tony. Toys.

Tony looks over the schematic images delivered to his cell.

'Where'd this come from.'

'Know that Chitauri behemoth from New York? We found some interesting gadgets inside. We wondered why its mass was so free from gravity fields. Now we know why, and want you to test this prototype.'

'I'll need to ask my mom. Can't you strap it onto the big man and ask him to jump into the sky?'

'We'll be in touch.'

* * *

** Package deployed**

'Well isn't that pretty?'

** Quite, sir**

The SHIELD prototype was attached to the back of the Iron Man. It's alloy casing hiding the alien technology. Shaped differently than anything Tony has ever designed, his profile resembled a man wearing an elongated snail shell which extended back beyond his feet. Tony could feel the hum of the unit as it powered up the special field that would soon envelop him.

The idea was for extended space flight for a first response team to any threat seen approaching with long range sensors and the ability to command a first strike if intentions we're not benign. As the unit approached full power, tony could perceive a shimmering ahead of him, as if he was being trapped in a glass. The stars and moon ahead blurred, until all around him, whichever way he looked, the universe seemed uniform.

**The field is deployed sir. Are you ready?**

'Let's find out. Engage final boost phase.'

The Iron Man suit smoothly accelerated into hyper speed

**Thirty Thousand Mph, sir. Fifty, sixty, seventy… We are exceeding one hundred thousand mph sir. Peaking at one hundred and five thousand. Congratulations are in order sir**

'Whoo-hoo! We did it buddy! We did it! Alright, burn for one hour, then de-accelerate or we'll smash right through the roof of Fury's spy glass on the moon.'

**Affirmative, sir. Shall I call Miss Potts?**

'Come again?'

**Shall I call director Fury?**

'Jarvis, when we finish the burn, I want you to run a diagnostic on yourself please.

** I am unable to reach Dr Banner, sir**

Tony didn't say anything. Whilst the special field was active, it interfered with much of the suits processing arrays. So they needed to be either shut down, or risk losing them altogether. The system the J.A.R.V.I.S program ran on was all that could be left on as it managed many of the SHIELD units functions. It was ironic Tony couldn't take a leak, because with the only functioning system he was relying on becoming compromised by an unknown, he started to get just a little scared.

'Hang in there buddy. We'll fix you up soon enough.'

** I'll appreciate that, Tony.**

Something very strange was going on.


End file.
